NEW YORK -- "Over the last year, The New York Times has twice published reports about secret anti-terrorism programs being run by the Bush administration," began a Times editorial last week. "Both times, critics have claimed that the paper was being unpatriotic or even aiding the terrorists ..."

The editorial went on to conclude that it will continue to provide information it believes the public needs. So what else is new?

On the same day, last Thursday, The Washington Post published a report by Charles Babington and Michael Abramowitz under the headline: "Bush Seeks to Use Media Leaks to His Advantage -- Attack on Newspapers Continues ..."

So what else is new?

This: The San Diego Union-Tribune, one of the steadiest Republican papers in the country, last Wednesday began its lead editorial under the sarcastic headline "Smash the Presses."

That one began: "Newspaper reporters and editors make judgments every working hour about what they will deliver to their readers. When it comes to national security, this demands a careful balancing of the public's legitimate right to know against the government's legitimate need to protect state secrets. When these two interests collide, as they often do, the First Amendment bars the government from muzzling the press."

Interesting, even obvious. But then the Union-Tribune, which was once considered a training ground for President Richard Nixon's press spokesmen -- most notably Herbert Klein and Gerald Warren -- went back over the history of Nixon's attacks on the press.

The editorial discussed the attempt to prevent The New York Times from publishing the Pentagon Papers, the official but secret history of the Vietnam War, and concluded that the Times was right and the president they so enthusiastically supported was wrong. "History," said the Union-Tribune, "shows the public interest was served."

Then the San Diego paper, which published the same information the Times did about the Bush administration's secret (and possibly illegal) vacuuming of telephone calls, e-mails and bank records, continued: "The Times and other publications, including this one, were entirely correct that the public's right to know about the bank-tracking program -- which raises important questions about individual privacy and the president's power to act without judicial oversight -- outweighed the Bush administration's claim of secrecy."

Indeed. So what is happening that tends to bring voices of freedom, patriotic voices of the left and right, together in the press? The answer is that the official loyal opposition, the Democratic Party, has generally dropped out of the debate -- even of government. Yes, the Democrats (or liberals, if you prefer) are out of the White House and in the minority in both houses of the Congress. That is a problem for them. But a worse problem for all of us is that they have, in general, kept their big mouths shut as President Bush moves steadily ahead in using the war on terror to turn the freest nation in history into a police state. Big Brother is watching and listening.

The Democrats' cynical refusal to engage in the battle for liberty at home in the name of transplanting it in far deserts and mountains has left the press as the only opposition to the White House's spreading power and abuse of legitimate authority. That is why the president and his vice president and their armies of lawyers are after reporters and anyone else in the press.

But the press is no political party. We destroy ourselves by being forced to take sides -- or being unable to find named sources on the "other" side on subjects such as illegal spying, torture and intimidation of the citizenry -- because, as the Post headlined, a president can use media leaks to his advantage. And he is. We would be delighted to use other voices, elected voices in the Congress, but their timidity leaves us doing what they should be doing. Agree or disagree with the president's assertions of imminent danger lurking everywhere, it is certainly a subject worth talking about and analyzing in the land of the free.

Years ago a great editor, Ben Bradlee of The Washington Post, a key figure in the Pentagon Papers case and then in Watergate, gave the commencement address at Duke University. As I remember it, he gave a ringing but serious endorsement of freedom and all things Jeffersonian, and then, as he ended, he took a step back, leaned into the microphone and said: "We're leaving you a great country. Don't screw it up!"

Only one thing I disagree with here--he makes it sound as though there are NO Democratic voices saying what is happening is wrong. There are definately some who are saying it long and loudly, as loudly as allowed without press to back them.

I would say the press doesn't pick up those who disagree with what is happening, they play along to get along. Are you really saying people like John Conyers http://johnconyers.com and Barbara Boxer http://barbaraboxer.com/ as well as people like Russ Feingold, Rush Holt who is trying to get a bill to the floor to demand a paper trail for voting machines, as well as many others are not speaking out?

Agreed, dori...but there are far too many Dems who currently have their heads in the sand. I'd feel a lot better if EVERY Democrat (of course, that leaves out LIEberman) was standing up against the policies of the Bush regime. I'd still believe we have a chance to save the Constitution from president idgit who thinks its just a piece of paper. I wish someone would remind him of the oath of office he took just before he started crowing about his "poliltical capital," which he spent eons ago.

The Powell Doctrine simply asserts that when a nation is engaging in war, every resource and tool should be used to achieve overwhelming force against the enemy. Well, the Bush administration and the Republican party have adapted this doctrine so to speak. They apply it differently however.

To them the “enemy” is the U.S. Constitution or anyone who defends it. The enemy is anyone who stands in the way of their power. The overwhelming force they use comes in several forms. They overwhelm you with lies, unconstitutional actions, secrets, attacks on our rights, crimes of all types. They overwhelm you with the variety and sheer volume of ways they steal or fix (redistricting) votes in elections. They overwhelm you with their full frontal assault on our environment. They simply are so overwhelmingly vile and criminal that it is hard to comprehend.

Maybe that is why some people have trouble believing what is happening. These guys are so bad that it is hard to believe, even if you see the evidence! Think about it

Catherine

_________________

"Behind every great fortune lies a great crime."Honore de Balzac

"Democrats work to help people who need help. That other party, they work for people who don't need help. That's all there is to it."~Harry S. Truman

I wish someone would remind him of the oath of office he took just before he started crowing about his "poliltical capital," which he spent eons ago.

Bush's only oath is to himself, and he is following that to the T. That is our problem but he doesn't consider it to be his problem. He is quite happy, thank you.

I, too, am dismayed when Dems don't act like Dems but if we are swimming in disbelief, can you imagine how it must be to try to follow the Constitution while the 'other side' is trashing it, shredding it, using it for tiolet paper? I can't picture what it must be like to be, say, Debbie Stabenow and not be swamped by loathing about what is happening to our country to the point where I can't work at all.

Every time I see a Dem vote to back R policy, I grind my teeth. I know money flows as though from a faucet around Washington and a great deal of it is labeled 'for Rs only'. If someone is going to run a campaign that person needs money. If it is a Dem, that person knows he/she will be trashed repeatedly. Rs run on character assassination. It is grueling, at best.

The temptation to have your vote 'bought' to give you money to run your next campaign has to be awfully hard to resist. That doesn't make it right to sell out, but I do see how it can happen.

As long as media remains a cesspool of misinformation, I don't see how the Dems can accomplish the good they very much want to do. There is no one in this area that I have met that doesn't believe Fox isn't telling the god's honest truth, after all, if it weren't true they couldn't say it!

How does one fight that?

Tom Reynolds, our laughingly called 'representative', plays Easter Bunny for months before an election, hopping around the district, handing out Easter eggs made of pure pork for good little boys and girls. Gets tons of free media play, all kissing his butt and making me very ill. He doesn't have to spend a dime, yet has a war chest that would sink a battleship.

How does one fight that?

We have someone running against Reynolds. He is an R running on the Dem line. His top ten issues? Never raise taxes, do away with the death tax, deport aliens, it reads like any R wish list does. I have been writing trying to get an answer from him on why these are his issues--haven't gotten one reply.

How does one fight that?

If I am frustrated and angry and feel betrayed, how must those Dems feel who actually do want to make the country better? And all they ever hear is, 'there isn't a dime's worth of difference between Democrats and Republicans.'

How demoralizing.

If this is another 'hate the government' site, I am in the wrong place. I just want to make the government better, have it live up to it's Constitutional duties and care about it's people again.

I hate the corruption and that is what I want to fight. I have no desire to attempt to take down people who actually DO want to do the right thing. And there IS a difference between them.

Tom Reynolds is a piece of shit. The district north of here is represented by Louise Slaughter--and she is terrific!

What we need are more terrific people in Washington. That isn't an easy objective. The only other course is to totally dismantle the government and start over.

Anyone believe that is a logical goal?

Btw, Jesse is right. The Rs 'enemy' is the Constitution and anyone who believes in it. And many Dems DO believe in it, I don't know how many Rs do, if any.